30 Free Self-Care Tools for Anxiety and Stress

30 Free Self-Care Tools for Anxiety and Stress

1. Belleruth Naparstek, LISW who has created guided imagery that’s used in hospitals across the country has a free guided meditation for stress reduction.
2. Calm is offering a number of free meditations addressing sleep, practices to soothe and calm kids.
3. Elisha Goldstein, Ph.D. is offering the Basics of Mindfulness Meditation: A 28 Day Program.
4. The Garrison Institute provides a free weekly Wednesday meditation.
5. The Greater Good Magazine suggests Six Daily Questions to Ask Yourself in Quarantine, and has created a Guide to Well-Being During Coronavirus.
6. Headspace is offering free meditations.
7. HealthyMinds guides you through the four pillars of the science of training the mind (meditation training).
8. Heartmath is giving 2 months of Connect with the Heart of Who You Truly Are. This is a 90-minute interactive learning experience to help you reduce stress and anxiety while increasing inner security and emotional poise.
9. Insight Timer meditation app – 40,000 free guided meditations.
10. Joan Borysenko, PhD, a Harvard-trained cell biologist and a psychologist is sharing 3 techniques for calming down during a stressful time.
11. Jud Brewer, MD, PhD has created a video with three tips for falling asleep (his third tip is especially helpful for when you wake up in the night and can’t get back to sleep).
12. Mindful Org has Free Mindfulness Resources to Find Calm and Nourish Resilience During the COVID Outbreak
13. The National Women’s Law Center created feminist coloring pages! to help provide a sense of calm, relaxation, and feminist joy in this tough moment. To share your beautiful art with them, post it on social with the hashtag #ColoringForHer!
14. The New York Times is offering the Calm Place.
15. Sanvello is offering its premium version for stress, anxiety and depression for the duration of the pandemic.
16. Shambhala Publications is offering free ebooks, an online course, at home yoga retreat and many free videos.
17. Six Seconds has created 14 EQ [Emotional Intelligence] Resources for Emotional Health during Coronavirus Times to ensure we’re each responding intentionally rather than reacting unconsciously.
18. Sounds True has created a digital care package to help you increase your resilience during challenging times including daily video sessions sharing insights from their recent online summits, opportunities for community connection, and webinars. 
19. Tara Brach and Jack Kornfield / Sounds True are providing a Free Half-Day At-Home Mindfulness Retreat. Completing this retreat including the scheduled breaks and walking meditation sessions requires about three hours.
20. Tara Brach, PhD, has made a “Guided Meditation for Times of Pandemic: Calling on Your Awakened Heart.”
21. Ten percent happier is providing free meditations and other resources to help providers and their clients manage their feelings of anxiety.
22. The Tapping Solution have an app with tapping meditations for COVID-19 anxiety, including “Feeling Safe and Secure” and “From Fear to Worry to Peace.”
23. Tricycle is offering live online practice sessions with teachers Jack Kornfield, Pema Chödrön, Sharon Salzberg, and others to help ease anxiety amid our social-distancing efforts.
24. Yale‘s happiness course (the Science of Wellbeing) is available for free online through Coursera.
25. 92nd Street Y’s Tools and Techniques for Helping Children and Parents Cope with Anxiety

Before moving onto the list of free workouts, you may wish to check out Grounding Techniques: 12 Ways to Calm Anxiety Fast for some simple tools to calm yourself when needed.

Workouts

1. Corepower Yoga – It is also offering free online guided meditations.
2. Dance with Me – dance tutorials.
3. Down Dog – app w/yoga for beginners, HIIT, barre, and 7 minute workout.
4. Do Yoga with Me
5. Fitbod Bodyweight Workouts
6. Fitness Blender
7. Mount Sinai Calm: Virtual Classes  including yoga, music therapy and art activities.
8. Planet Fitness – on-demand workout sessions.
9. PopSugar Fitness
10. Yoga with Adriene
11. The YMCA is offering many free online exercise classes.

Need some one-on-one assistance to help you cope with these difficult times? Please feel free to schedule an appointment to see me virtually. 

When Self-Care Tools for Anxiety Aren’t Enough

Self-care tools are powerful. They help you regulate your nervous system, manage symptoms, and build resilience.

But sometimes, anxiety runs deeper than what self-care alone can address.

If you’ve been practicing these tools consistently and still feel stuck, it may be time to explore therapy. Anxiety often has roots in past experiences, unprocessed trauma, or nervous system patterns that need professional support to shift.

EMDR therapy is particularly effective for anxiety because it works directly with how your brain stores stress and threat responses. Rather than just managing symptoms, EMDR helps your nervous system update old patterns that keep you feeling on edge.

You don’t have to do this alone. If anxiety is interfering with your work, relationships, or sense of peace, let’s talk.

Schedule a free consultation to explore whether EMDR therapy is right for you.

Last updated: December 6, 2025